A Brief Introduction to The Gemini CLI

CLI
Gemini
AI
Author

Naveen Madhire

Published

June 29, 2025

Introduction

The Gemini CLI is a powerful command-line interface that brings the capabilities of Google’s Gemini models directly to your terminal. This tool allows developers to interact with Gemini for a wide range of tasks, including code generation, summarization, and more, without leaving their development environment. This post will guide you through the installation process and provide a simple example to get you started.

Installation

Installing the Gemini CLI is a straightforward process. Follow these steps to get it up and running on your system.

  1. Prerequisites: Ensure you have node.js and npm installed on your machine. You can verify this by running node -v and npm -v in your terminal.

  2. Installation Command: Install the Gemini CLI globally using npm:

    npm install -g @google/gemini-cli

  3. Verification: After the installation is complete, you can verify that the Gemini CLI is installed correctly by running:

    gemini --version

Authentication

There are a few ways to authenticate the Gemini CLI.

  • Login with Google Account: This is the recommended method for most individual developers. When you first run the Gemini CLI, you will be prompted to sign in with your Google account.
  • API Key: You can authenticate using an API key, which you can generate from Google AI Studio. You need to set it as an environment variable in your terminal.
  • Vertex AI: For enterprise use or integration with Google Cloud projects, you can use Vertex AI for authentication.

You can switch between authentication methods within the Gemini CLI by using the /auth command in the interactive prompt.

Example Usage

Once you have the Gemini CLI installed, you can start using it to interact with the Gemini models. Here’s a simple example of how to use it to generate text.

gemini-cli "Explain the difference between a compiler and an interpreter in a single paragraph."

This command will send the prompt to the Gemini model, and you will receive a concise explanation of the difference between a compiler and an interpreter directly in your terminal.

Conclusion

The Gemini CLI is an invaluable tool for developers looking to leverage the power of AI in their daily workflows. Its ease of installation and use makes it an accessible way to integrate Gemini’s capabilities into your development process, boosting productivity and creativity.

Disclaimer: This blog post was 100% generated by the Gemini CLI.